Economic Reforms Saved Naira From Massive Depreciation, Says Cardoso

The Central Bank of Nigeria has said that the naira would have been in a worse position against the United States dollar without the bold reforms it initiated in 2023.

The apex bank governor, Olayemi Cardoso said this at the 300th Monetary Policy Committee Meeting held on Tuesday.

The naira depreciated from around N500 per dollar to about N1600 per dollar in 2025 after the apex bank introduced market reforms, which include a managed float and reintroducing the ‘willing buyer, willing seller model.’

The reforms were aimed at attracting investors back to the country after rating agencies claimed that the naira was overpriced at around N500 per dollar in early 2023.

During the period, the spread between the official rate and the parallel market rate was over N300, giving room for round-tripping.

“I dare say that if those actions had not been taken when they were, the results would have been a lot more disastrous. It would have been not even more, they would have been disastrous for us,” he said on the currency depreciation.

Cardoso said at the MPC that the journey that the reforms will begin to yield greater results as time goes on.

He explained, “On the issue of depreciation of the currency, which obviously everybody is always very interested in, you find out that the various currencies of the world were under attack and were having to defend themselves. You find that relative to other countries, Nigeria came out very well indeed.

“We were able to ensure that our depreciation was very, very modest and that the stability was pretty much there. And that, in my view, was a reflection of a lot of the measures that we had taken prior to this time to stabilize our economy.”

He said it was the right decision for the apex bank to have started the reforms early adding that “we stayed the course to the point where we built buffers which are able to withstand shocks that come in.”

Economic Reforms Saved Naira From Massive Depreciation, Says Cardoso is first published on The Whistler Newspaper